Coffin Lid of Horwennefer

Lid of a mummiform coffin inscribed for Hor-wen-nefer, a high-ranking priest at the sacred city of Abydos. Hor-wen-nefer’s coffin shows him reborn in the image of Osiris the god of the Underworld. His golden face follows the belief that the skin of the gods was made of gold. He wears a wig the same blue colour as lapis-lazuli, a precious stone that the god’s hair was made from. The plaited and curled beard is of the kind only ever worn by gods and kings. He wears a broad collar of beads and rosettes. Beneath this is an image of the winged goddess Nut, and below her are five vertical lines of inscription running the length of the lid, painted in black hieroglyphs of a yellow ground. Flanking these columns are the figures of various deities. At the top left is Hapy, beneath whom is Qebehsenuef and then Nephthys. The order on the right is Imsety at the top, Duamutef in the middle and Isis at the bottom. Lines one to five contain shirt utterances by the Four Sons of Horus in which they promise to protect the life of Hor-wen-nefer. The three cenrtral lines invoke the goddesses Mut and Nut, and express similar ideas of protection.